“Hey brah, can I hit you up for that 40 mil yet?” —Hun Sen holds court at the Strongmen’s Picnic on Sunday.

Strongman funeral roll-call time!

Hun Sen, Cambodia — The Cambodian judiciary last year released the two men accused of gunning down trade union leader Chea Vichea in broad daylight back in 2004. Despite numerous witnesses placing them hundreds of kilometres away, and the first trial judge (later sacked by the government) throwing out the case, the pair spent years in prison. Back in 2013, the government agreed to partially fund and erect a two-metre tall statue of Chea, on the condition that garment unions put a halt to an annual anniversary march to the site of his assassination in Wat Lanka. Hun Sen recently announced a plan to build a 16-storey tall statue of himself across the river from downtown Phnom Penh.

Thongsing Thammavong, Laos — Last year criminalised online criticism of his government and made internet service providers liable for the online conduct of their subscribers.

Park Geun-hye, South Korea — Remains the subject of an ongoing investigation as to whether the National Intelligence Service was conscripted to promote her presidential campaign, a flagrant breach of the country’s 1988 constitution.

Xi Jinping, China — Last year 79-year-old Hong Kong editor Yiu Mantin was apprehended and brought up on smuggling charges during a visit to mainland China, after his publishing company announced plans to release a critical biography of Xi. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, or a shade under 18 months for each of the seven cans of paint he was accused of illegally importing.

Prayuth Chan-ocha, Thailand — “‘We’ll probably just execute them,’ said Mr Prayuth, without a trace of a smile, when asked by reporters how the government would deal with those who did not adhere to the official line.”

Thein Sein, Burma — Three men sentenced to 2.5 years with hard labour in March for “religious offence” after releasing a promotional nightclub flyer featuring a picture of the Buddha wearing headphones. Former opposition member and prominent columnist Htin Lin Oo facing at least two years in prison for having the audacity to claim that Buddhism strictly forbade violence against other religions. Despite his promise to grant amnesty to all political prisoners at the end of 2013, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners reports 170 political prisoners remain behind bars, with another 238 activists awaiting trial, mostly on “unlawful assembly” charges. Some are under the age of 18.

Shinzo Abe, Japan — Along with 13 of the 20 members of his cabinet, and 289 of the 480 members of parliament, Abe is a member of Nippon Kaigi, an organisation which argues, inter alia, that “the 1946-1948 Tokyo War Crimes tribunals were illegitimate, and that the killings by Imperial Japanese troops during the 1937 ‘Nanjing massacre’¹ were exaggerated or fabricated.” OK, LOL. In government, has sought constitutional workarounds to remilitarise the country.

Najib Razak, Malaysia — Denied the interference of Barisan Nasional, which has ruled continuously since 1957, in opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s prosecution and return to the clink.

Tony Abbott, Australia — Fuckwit.

Voldemort, United States — The only man with more Cambodian blood on his hands than Pol Pot and Co. Somewhere in a parallel dimension better than this one, France and the States swapped him for Polanski and they both went to rot in a dungeon somewhere (preferably before the latter released Carnage).

You can kill the man, but you can’t kill the weltanschauung. At least these guys made the trains run on time, am I right?

“Mein Führer, I can walk!” (Alternate caption: “ROSEBUD!”)

This Salon article misses the mark, so let’s start tearing down this fire hazard-sized straw man before Mrs. O’Leary’s cow kicks over a lantern and the whole fucking place goes up.

First clue: “Clinton & Kissinger should be ashamed,” reads the teaser—as if the man who executed a death row convict so mentally stunted he saved the pecan pie dessert from his last meal “for later”, or the man who turned Chile into the world’s first neo-liberal petri dish, had the capacity for shame.

Clue Part Deux: “While Singapore’s material progress is beyond question, the argument that democracy and economic advances are mutually exclusive rests on paper-thin logic of the kind Lee did all he could to promote.” Speaking of paper-thin logic, haven’t heard many vocal proponents of the idea that economic advances necessitate democratic governance lately. China’s economy just overtook America’s: where you at, Fukuyama? Anyone whose Nostradamus act relies on Hegel will always get smacked in the face when the pendulum comes swinging back, so off with you to the chateau in Salò to eat your words.

Clue the Third: the author rests his case by quoting Amos Yee, the 16-year-old kid now facing a spell in old chokey for having the audacity—the sheer nerve of it all—to claim that money + prosperity ≠ happiness: “Lee was a dictator but managed to fool most of the world into thinking he was democratic…” WRONGALONGADINGDONG. Sorry kid, I’d say your age is a mitigating factor but your government certainly doesn’t agree.

Lee didn’t pull the veil over anyone’s eyes. For the West, so long as you’re not drinking from goblets fashioned out of the skulls of your enemies, commerce > human rights.² The less objectionable members of his Easternfanclub (China between Deng and Xi, Mahathir) admired him for his economic success, which in their eyes was inextricably linked to his autocratic leadership. The worse ones (Suharto, post-’97 Hun Sen, about half of the Burmese junta c. 1988-2010) admired him because he was an autocrat, jettisoning all that superfluous nation-building malarkey and raiding the treasury to bankroll their families and crony networks.

They say if you wander the subterranean halls of the RAND Corporation at midnight, you can still hear the ghostly voice of Francis Fukuyama, faintly calling: “One out of three ain’t baaaaaad”

There is precisely one timeless law of political science to emerge from the 20th century. Take it away Robert Michels, court philosopher to Il Duce: “after x amount of time, any organization or polity, no matter how democratically structured, will inevitably become oligarchic.” There is a reason that Asia looked to Singapore as the Paris of 1789 looked to America, and you and I both will spend the rest of our lives in the shadow of Marina Bay Sands, learning just what it means.

Lee is dead. The Age of Lee is just beginning.

1. Also known as the Rape of Nanking, a title earlier in vogue within WWII historiography. Why was it called the Rape of Nanking, you ask? [SPOILER ALERT] There was a lot of rape.
2. For the years 1945-89, substitute for Cold War scuttlebutt > human rights.